Uganda Honey Trade Project 2010-14

This Project was completed in 2014. For four years we worked with partners to build honey trade in Uganda, enabling thousands of poor households to increase their incomes. Families have succeeded in securing resilient and sustainable livelihoods through beekeeping.

KABECOS

The Project supported an existing beekeeper-owned, honey-trading group called the Kamwenge Beekeepers Cooperative Society (KABECOS). This community-based social enterprise provides a fair and reliable route to market for beekeepers in Kamwenge, in south-west Uganda.

National

At the national level we helped build the capacity of the national industry association, TUNADO, to enable it to advocate on behalf of all beekeepers. The result is a proactive and established mouthpiece for the many thousands of small-scale beekeepers in Uganda.

Regional

Work with ApiTrade Africa was focussed particularly on the stubborn challenges of fairtrade and organic certification for Africa’s beekeepers: the Project helped build expertise and experience within this emerging trade body.

We are proud of our achievements

KABECOS was able to increase its honey purchases from the community from 2 tonnes in 2010 to 17 tonnes in 2014

The number of beekeepers accessing this market rose from less than 100 to over 300 in 2014

Having a reliable market for their honey encouraged beekeepers to increase production - on average sales per beekeeper doubled over the course of the Project

The number of women and youth taking up beekeeping as a business rose considerably

Women are building savings groups - to make the best use of the income they earn from honey selling